Crossing Hell: Inside the Deadly Journey of Iranian Refugees to Britain

by Aida Ghajar

The inflatable boat had a hole in it.

Arshia knew it. His friend knew it. The smuggler knew it too, and told them to keep quiet. 63 other passengers couldn’t know, they couldn’t panic.

Every 30 minutes, as the overcrowded dinghy pushed through the English Channel, the two young men took turns pumping air back into it.

There were 65 people on board - at least 10 women, more than 15 young children, an infant, and 14 teenagers.

All of them were crammed into a vessel slowly deflating beneath them.

To the smugglers, the passengers’ lives meant nothing, according to Arshia, whose real name is withheld for security reasons.

Six months later, the 22-year-old Iranian is in Britain, his leg still aching from a beating he received from the smugglers before the boat even left the shore.

He survived, but the cost - still haunting him - shows the crisis in northern France, where desperate refugees are trapped by armed gangs that treat people as cargo, as money, and, in the case of young women, as sexual objects.

This is the hidden world of the Channel crossing, seen through the eyes of a survivor.

Dunkirk’s forests have become a strange marketplace, ruled by two forces: hope and exploitation.

Kurdish smuggling networks control Dunkirk, while Afghan groups operate in nearby Calais, dividing northern France into territories as clearly defined as any criminal enterprise.

"For example, northeast Dunkirk is controlled by one smuggler and a human trafficking group. Northwest is controlled by another. Some even partner with each other," Arshia explains.

The operation is surprisingly organized. Smugglers’ tents sit just meters from refugee camps, but with far better facilities: power generators, showers, and a variety of food.

These aren’t temporary shelters - they’re business hubs, charging £1,500 ($1,960) to £5,000 ($6,530) per crossing.

Refugees typically find these networks through two channels. Some connect with the smugglers who moved them from Turkey into Europe, who then hand them off to partners in France.

Others simply arrive in the forests and ask around. According to multiple refugees, smugglers and their clients can also be found easily in cafes near the main stations of Calais and Dunkirk.

"Before reaching France, you call the same smuggler who brought you from Turkey to Europe. Smugglers are connected," Arshia says. "From the beginning, they tell you: 'Don’t worry, we have our own people. He’s my partner, charges £1,500–2,000, gives you the location, you stay in the forest for a few days, and then go to Britain.'"

But the transaction is rarely that simple. Not all passengers pay the same price, and not all payments are made in cash.

East Asian refugees, Arshia says, sometimes pay up to £5,000 and receive special treatment: accommodation in the smugglers' own tents, better food, and more attention. They are the VIP passengers, at least officially.

But there’s another category of VIP that makes Arshia’s voice drop when he speaks of it.

"For smugglers, it doesn’t matter how old a female refugee is - it’s enough that she’s single and pretty," he says.

"They take her to their tents, and for several days, they pass these women among themselves and sexually exploit them."

He witnessed it directly. A young woman traveling with her brother was separated at gunpoint. The smugglers took the girl to their tent while the brother was helpless against armed men carrying Kalashnikovs, pistols, blades, and knives.

The pitch to vulnerable women is both a threat and an offer: Come with us, we’ll protect you, we’ll charge you less. Isolated, terrified, and often without resources, some comply.

The alternative - facing the forest alone at night, where violence is random and frequent - seems worse.

"Smugglers tell the woman, ‘You’re alone, come to us, we’ll take care of you.’ In return, they charge her less money, and the woman, either out of fear for her life or her money, is forced to submit to their demands," Arshia says.

A refugee woman who had been passed among smugglers a few years ago said, "At least you know your life is safe and one of the bigwigs rapes you, rather than being raped in the forest or street at any moment or having the fear of rape."

When Arshia’s boat finally departed, a smuggler loaded one young woman first. "This is my VIP passenger. Take care of her," he told the others. "Everyone understood what that meant."

Violence in northern France’s refugee camps has escalated dramatically, according to French activists and refugees interviewed for this report. Everyone emphasizes the same point: this isn’t what it used to be.

One French activist who recently returned from the region described the transformation: "Smugglers are in the camps too. They’re armed there as well, and violence is prevalent. When it gets dark, one must not stay outside under any circumstances."

The weapons are everywhere and varied: Kalashnikovs, pistols, blades, knives. Smugglers are criminal gangs for whom "killing is like drinking water," multiple sources report.

When Arshia arrived in France and headed to Dunkirk, he learned that two people had just killed each other in a gunfight.

A week earlier, an armed clash between Kurdish and African smuggling networks had left at least six people dead from the African group.

On Tuesday night, smugglers even fired shots at a group of Iranian journalists documenting conditions in northern France.

"They are smugglers, they have guns. Power and decision are in their hands. Killing is nothing to them. They can easily shoot a bullet in your head," Arshia says.

He learned this firsthand. Before his boat even launched, he was beaten by smugglers. Several passengers had disobeyed orders - the smugglers drew batons and struck heads and bodies. Arshia’s leg was damaged badly enough that British authorities took him to a hospital for several hours after the crossing.

In refugee vernacular, each attempt to cross the Channel is called a "game" or "try." The terminology comes from attempts to illegally cross any border, but here it has a different context.

Smugglers typically plan multiple games in a single night - a military-style operation designed to overwhelm French police resources.

Two games serve as decoys: refugees sent on foot in visible groups of 50-60. Police spot them and mobilize teams to intercept. Meanwhile, the real crossings happen elsewhere, with refugees transported by truck to departure points.

Newly arrived refugees are assigned to the "burned games" - the decoys meant to fail. Those who have waited days or weeks get slots in the successful attempts.

Arshia’s first game burned exactly as designed. When the equipment truck arrived, the police followed closely. The driver abandoned the vehicle and fled - if caught, he would face years in prison and lose his truck. Police fired shots in the air and launched tear gas. No one reached the boat.

His second game was scheduled to succeed.

At midnight, smugglers moved the refugees from Dunkirk’s forests. After 30 minutes of walking, a truck picked them up. By 1:30 a.m., they reached the shore.

Twenty to thirty people helped unload and prepare equipment: the boat, motor, petrol, and life jackets.

They inflated the boat. That’s when Arshia and his friend discovered the hole. The smuggler confirmed it but demanded silence. At 2:30 a.m., the boat hit the water. Within an hour, all 65 passengers were aboard.

The journey took six hours. Every 30 minutes, Arshia and his friend pumped air back into the failing vessel while others tried to keep the infant quiet and the children calm.

Forty minutes after departure, still in French waters, two speedboats approached - fast vessels like jets, Arshia recalls.

They asked if help was needed. The refugees said no - accepting help meant being returned to France. The speedboats shadowed them briefly, then disappeared.

French coast guard vessels followed at 100 meters, an escort of sorts, watching the boat approach the maritime border.

When they crossed into British waters, four drones appeared overhead. Finally, a British rescue ship arrived.

"When we reached the British shore, they took photos and videos of us. They usually show these in the news and say that, for example, on this date we rescued refugees from the sea," Arshia says.

Despite everything - the 10-month illegal journey from Iran through multiple countries, five days in Dunkirk’s forests, the beating, the sexual exploitation he witnessed, the punctured boat, the armed violence, and the infant crying through the night crossing - Arshia says he would do it again.

"I didn’t even have a passport. I couldn’t come by any route other than the illegal route. Here at least, your human rights are respected. If you try, study, you progress. If you start a business, you can progress. You just need the will," he says.

When asked about Britain’s new deportation policies and asylum reforms - changes designed specifically to deter crossings like his - Arshia dismisses them as irrelevant to his situation.

"For a while, they said they would deport refugees. It didn’t happen. This process takes at least three to four months to be approved. Even if approved, its implementation goes to 2026 - these laws won’t apply to me," he says.

His response reflects a broader pattern visible in Telegram groups and social media networks where refugees share information.

Despite ongoing policy changes, including a "one in, one out" exchange agreement between Britain and France, and the UK Home Secretary’s recent announcement of extensive asylum reforms, Iranian refugees continue to view Britain as their ultimate destination.

Some are refugees who have already received rejection notices in other European countries like Germany. Britain remains the last hope.

Yet having survived the journey, Arshia now issues warnings to others, especially women and families with children.

"Having gone through this route, I tell everyone, especially women, that you who have endured until now, wait a little longer, save up money, and come with a visa," he says.

"People believe the words of smugglers who swear oaths in social media groups. I can’t even look at these groups again. I feel sick from all these lies and the deceptive tone of smugglers."

"People only see that I’ve arrived, but they don’t know how much suffering and hardship I endured, how much disrespect I tolerated to get here," he adds. "I don’t understand how families take young children with them on this route."